WE DESIGN & BUILD BETTER COMMUNITIES
DownCity Design empowers people to imagine and create better futures for their community, using the tools of design.
Since our founding in 2009, more than 2200 young designers have celebrated the unveiling of more than 80 youth-designed, youth-built public projects in the city of Providence over the past decade.
At the Peace and Plenty Oasis ribbon cutting, our young designer Nicholas gazed in awe at the rainwater collection and shade structure his team had created for a community garden. “We built this!” Nick exclaimed. “There was nothing here before, just dirt and rocks. There was nothing. We made this from nothing!”
“I realized that we were building something for my community — for other people of color and for youth. This was impact!”
- Nick Ong, DCD Alum & Educator
This is power—the power of creation.
PROVIDENCE NEEDS DESIGN THINKING & CREATIVITY
Providence has the third highest income inequality in the US, after Washington, DC and Atlanta.
Most DownCity Design program participants have grown up in poverty, with 83% of DCD participants reporting a household income of $24,000 or less. Our city’s harsh inequality even extends to the school buildings, parks, playgrounds and public streets in the neighborhoods DownCity Design serves.
DownCity Design provides a space for Providence community members to imagine, design and build their own better public places and amenities.
From our very first day, we’ve seen that design challenges awaken a power in students that’s asleep all day in school: the power to create change. Taking a project from design to creation develops a whole range of hands-on skills. But the most important lessons are habits of mind and work – skills our alumni can apply anywhere, and for the rest of their lives.
THE NEXT STEP: OUR COMMUNITY DESIGN STUDIO
Now, we’re wielding our creative energy to tackle our biggest design-build project ever: DownCity Re|Design, a plan for Providence’s first Community Design Center.